Shane Meyer – To the broken coast / on the crystal wave / it’s you, oh / hey
On his latest full-length, Buffalo’s Shane Meyer reaffirms his status as one of the area’s most distinct and disarming songwriters. A veteran of the scene, formerly of the slacker-rock outfit Difficult Night, Meyer’s solo work has found its own lane and cruises there comfortably. His new album, released August 1st on Steak & Cake Records, arrives with the wonderfully unwieldy title, to the broken coast / on the crystal wave / it’s you, oh / hey. Failure to edit? Perhaps. But it seems messy on purpose: across ten tracks of sparkling, minimalist jangle-pop, Meyer continues to perfect his unassuming, heart-on-sleeve style, delivering fractured vignettes of life that are gentle on the ear but carry surprising emotional weight.
The core of the album’s sound is Meyer’s intricate fingerpicked acoustic guitar, which provides the foundation for nearly every track. The arrangements are often sparse, allowing his lyrics and uniquely conversational delivery to take center stage. There’s a stream-of-consciousness quality to the proceedings that feels incredibly inviting, as if you’re sitting in the room with him as the songs take shape. It’s a sound that exists somewhere between the fragile constructions of Sparklehorse and the wry poeticism of Pavement’s Malkmus, held together by an earnest charm that is entirely Meyer’s own.
Lyrically, Meyer is a master of juxtaposition, pairing upbeat arrangements with deeply introspective and often defeatist words. On the beachy bop of “Pineapple Plantation,” he cheerfully croons, “gosh I got older / now I identify with ugly people,” a gut-punch of a line delivered with a smile. He reveals his more pastoral, poetic side on “My Morning Is Spoken For,” which uses samples of songbirds to frame a devastating metaphor for fleeting existence: “imagine you’re a cherry blossom, pink and white / dormant winter long then come to life… you surprise yourself, your ephemeral self / as the wind picks up / you wave for help.”
The album’s creative ambition is most evident in its set pieces. The title track, “To The Broken Coast,” is a beautifully hushed and hypnotic ballad, built on little more than an acoustic melody and a shaker. When Meyer tenderly sings the entire album title in the song’s final moments, the sprawling name suddenly clicks into place, feeling both intentional and earned. Later, on “45 in a 30,” a confessional track about defeat drifts along on a gorgeous bed of jangly guitars and piano before its stunning conclusion. Meyer repeats the line “45 in a school zone,” adding 10 mph with each repetition until he hits 105, at which point the instrumentation gives out, delicately and unceremoniously collapsing under its own velocity.
It’s these moments of unexpected craft that elevate the album. Meyer packages profound, universal truths in these light, acoustic gems, a talent perfectly captured on the closer “Waiting On a Friend.” He sings, “sometimes I laugh so hard I start to cry / sometimes I cry so hard I have to laugh / can’t write it down in a paragraph,” and you feel the weight of that simple, impossible contradiction. to the broken coast… is an album full of such moments – charming, honest, and quietly brilliant snapshots from one of Buffalo’s finest songwriters. Name your price on the Steak & Cake bandcamp page here.
Categorised in: Album of the Week
This post was written by Ronald Walczyk